Pakistan govt's expenses shoot up to Rs1.1 trillion in 2 months

Pakistan's expenditure touched the figure as the country continues to struggle with floods.

Alarmingly, during July-August period of the current fiscal year, over 71 percent of the current expenses were on account of just two heads – the interest payments on loans and the defence, according to the sources in the Ministry of Finance as quoted by The Express Tribune.

This left very little behind to spend on the welfare and the development of the country.

The fiscal figures are provisional and are subject to changes once the reconciled data is available at the end of the quarter (July-September).

However, Pakistan has assured the International Monetary Fund that if monthly fiscal operations data indicate that spending is running higher than the first quarter and subsequent target; this will trigger immediate remedial action to put in place the contingency revenue measures.

The government has conceded before the IMF that “the compression of current spending is ambitious”.

The initial trend indicates that even if the floods had not struck Pakistan, it was impossible to achieve the primary budget surplus target of Rs153 billion the government agreed with the IMF.